Chords for 5 USEFUL Tips For Making Chord Progressions Tutorial

[C] The toughest part about writing chord progressions is keeping things interesting.
Luckily, there are numerous chord tools that can help you keep things flavorful when you're writing.
Let's talk about the 5 tips for writing better chord progressions.
So let's just start off with a basic I-VI-IV-V progression in C major.
_ [Am] _ _ [F] _ _
[G] _ Now this has a [C] nice flow to it, but it's pretty boring.
What can we do?
Tip number 1.
Chord Substitutions.
By subbing the last two chords in the progression to their relative minor,
we can give the progression new flavor without compromising the overall tone of the progression.
To do this, we just need to whip [F] out our handy circle of fifths and locate both our last two chords.
F [G] major and G major.
[Dm] The circle of fifths tells us that the relative minor of F major is D minor,
while the relative minor of G major [Em] is E minor.
[C] This is what our substituted progression sounds like.
_ [Am] _ _
[Dm] _ _ [Em] _ _ Tip number 2.
Sevenths.
Adding sevenths to your chord progression can give it a much more rich sound
compared to chords that consist of only a bass triad.
To find out which note to add in order to make a seventh chord,
all we have to do is count four semitones up from the fifth of each major chord,
and three semitones up from each minor chord.
Except in the case of the G major, we count three steps up,
because in this key, [C] G becomes a G dominant seventh.
_ [Am] _
_ [F] _ _ [G] _ _ Tip number 3.
Voice Spreading.
Now that we have these rich seventh chords, we can take things a step further.
By spreading our voicing across the keyboard.
This just means that we're going to pitch [C] some notes an octave up,
and some notes an octave down,
so we cover more real estate across the frequency spectrum.
This method requires some experimenting to find out which voicing sounds the best for your ears.
Let's hear our spread out progression.
_ [Am] _ _
[F] _ _ [G] _ _ Tip number 4.
Ninths.
Now, we've already added sevenths,
but we can actually take this a step further and add ninths to our progression,
to make each chord even bigger.
The ninth is just the second note in a given chord's scale, but pushed an octave up.
For our C chord, we will write in a D on top,
for the A minor, a B,
for the F, a G,
and for the G, an A.
This is our progression with the ninths [C] added. _
_ _ [Am] _ _ [G] _ [C] And just like before, we can spread the voicing out as well.
_ _ [Am] _ _ [G] _ _
_ [C] Tip number 5.
Melody.
A lot of times we tend to think of our chord progressions as just a bed for other melodic instruments.
But, chord progressions can carry melody too.
By using our ears, we can add notes to the top of the chord progression to give it more depth and movement.
Check this out.
_ [Am] _ _ [F] _ _
[G] _ _ [C] _ _ [Am] _ _ [F] _ _
[G] _ _ [C] If you found this video helpful, check out www.samplify.us.
There you'll find more downloads and resources for the Modern Producer.
Thanks for [Am] watching.
_ [F] _ _ [G] _ _ [Em] _ _ [C] _ _ _ _
[G] _ _ [C] _ _ [Am] _ _ [F] _ _
[G] _ _ [C] _ _ [Am] _ _ [Dm] _ _